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Bruce Prichard Discusses Jeff Jarrett & Road Dogg Walking Out of WWE At In Your House 2, Talking to Jarrett About the Incident
Image Credit: WWE
On the latest edition of Something to Wrestle, Bruce Prichard discussed Jeff Jarrett and Roadie (Road Dogg Jesse James) quitting WWE following the In Your House 2 PPV. Jarrett and Roadie walked out of the show after Jarrett’s loss to Shawn Michaels, despite being scheduled to do a split angle with Road Dogg after the match. The original plan was to have Roadie revealed as the real singer of “With My Baby Tonight” and that Jarrett was lip syncing during a concert on the show. That angle didn’t end up happening. Then Roadie was supposed to accidentally cost Jarrett his match with Shawn Michaels, which did happen, and the two were then supposed to split up. WWE had to instead talk about the two splitting up backstage without actually having the two do an angle. There were all sorts of rumors on why the two quit, such as feeling like the split angle was premature, thinking that Jerry Jarrett (who was working as a consultant with WCW at the time) had plans for them, as well as wanting to jump to WCW. Ultimately, both were under contract to WWE, and Jarrett ended up returning to WWE in December 1995 while Roadie returned in late 1996, revealing that he had been the real singer of “With My Baby Tonight” and that Jarrett had been lip syncing. Jarrett ended up signing with WCW in October of 1996. Highlights are below.
On Vince McMahon’s reaction to Jarrett and Road Dogg walking out: “Not real happy. I wasn’t real happy. My brother was actually the one who came up to gorilla to tell me, he said, ‘Yeah, Jeff and Brian just left and said they quit.’ I was like, ‘OK, great,’ and continued on with the show.”
On if Road Dogg walked out over loyalty to the Jarretts: “I would call it stupidity. I would call it naïveté, didn’t think it through, believed in somebody that obviously had an axe to grind and had a history of just being Jerry Jarrett. To that extent, look, we all have to make our own decisions, and Brian and Jeff made a decision based on whatever information, whatever they were told and sold, if you will. I believe it was the wrong decision, but I also know from our vantage point that every step of the way, they were aware of what we were going to do, how we were going to do it, and had input into it.”
On how he was hurt by the way Jarrett and Road Dogg walked out: “So it was a shock to me, it was a shock to Pat [Patterson], but it also hurt. That was one that hurt because all you had to do was say, ‘I don’t want to do this,’ or, ‘Can we do it a different way?’ or something like that. Versus, just saying, ‘Oh, well, Vince didn’t talk to us, and we didn’t like the way it was going,’ and you never made an attempt, at least that we know of, to talk to Vince and tell him that, and you had many, many opportunities to tell us and instead you yeah-yeahed us to death to the point that we felt everybody was on board and everybody was good to go. So to that, shame on you, and we move on. It wasn’t received well by me, I can definitely tell you that.”
On if he has talked to Jeff Jarrett about the incident: “I talked to Jeff about it when he came back and I’ve talked to Jeff about it over the years. I think we agree to disagree and I think that Jeff realizes now that that wasn’t the greatest move in the world to make. So being in a position of being a promoter and being in a position of trying to do a television show and work with a lot of talent, and then have somebody treat you like that, all of a sudden you go, ‘Oh wow, maybe I didn’t handle that the best way.’ So I don’t agree with the way Jeff and Road Dogg handled it, in any way, shape, or form, and wish it wouldn’t have happened because I think the angle on the story we had laid out would have been awesome.”
On Jerry Lawler telling WWE that Jeff and Road Dogg had quit: “Lawler pulled us over on the side of the road to inform us that Brian and Jeff were in Jerry Jarrett’s hot tub drinking champagne, and they’ve quit, they’re not coming back, they’re gonna start in WCW, and that was Jerry Jarrett to Jerry Lawler and Jerry Lawler to us.”
If using any of the above quotes, please credit Something to Wrestle with an h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.
